The Fishy - Grimsby Town FC

Question of the Week

Who will go down?







 

No Way To Downsize!

By: Mertle
Date: 05/01/2004

IT'S that time of the year folks. Players whose contracts run out at the end of the season, now have the right to talk to others. Last season many of the players out of contract, where those we would rather not want to keep anyway.

Home > Features > 2004 Features > No Way To Downsize


This season it's the time for Jevons, Boulding, Pouton and Campbell.

Love them or hate Campbell and Jevons have taken some flack from the fans for their performances. However the problem is these are the players rightly or wrongly we paid a transfer fee for.

So basically due to the fact we paid money they are the entire blue ribboned quartet we cannot afford to allow to go by a freebie. The problem is, did we get value for money or did we get taken for a ride when our hard earned cash was spent in the transfers?

Well you have to say Everton must have laughed all away to the bank when we paid £250,000. Yet, to be fair to Jevons and to his defence after a bright Grimsby start he had a lot of personal problems. He was only 22 when he came and it must have been a wrench to leave his friends and family. It also did not help when fans and a namely Mr Furneaux decided to go on a witch-hunt.

Suddenly Jevons found himself frozen out and to be fair to the lad he has come out a stronger person for it. He at first was knocking goals in the reserves only to find the manager was not interested. He finally got his chance and showed Groves up by scoring.

He may not be worth £250,000 and at one stage due to the high wage it was difficult to send him out on loan. The fact is Grimsby has to try and claw back as much of the transfer fee possible.

Campbell cost us £200,000 from Leicester and despite some erratic performances he is another one Town have paid good money for we that can ill afford to flush down the toilet. The fee we paid may be a little high but it could be a fee town might nearly claw back. He can be infuriating as he has bags of ability but only seems to show it in patches. To me he strikes me of Butterfield's time with town and it's likely to be a confidence thing.

Pouton is our hard man, though at times often gets himself into trouble with challenges without thinking with his head. We paid York £150,000 and in some respects he has at times been worth every penny. Like him or hate him when Pouts is on form and not getting himself in trouble for reckless challenges he gives us strength in midfield. He may not be the gods' gift for shooting but he's Pouton.

All 3 players are in the top 12 of Grimsby's all time spending and equate to a combined outlay of £650,000. Surely the club cannot afford to flush that sort of dough down the preverbal bosman toilet.

No. I have not forgotten Boulding. The fee we paid has been described as nominal or unknown but lets be honest we could get roughly £200,000 if we sold him. He may not have the pace he used to have in his first spell. I think he still has injury problems but you cannot argue that if it was not for his goals, Town would be next if not worse than Wycombe, rooted.

If they all left on a Bosman we could be flushing away a considerable amount of money, which could keep the club afloat.

So why have the board or namely Mr Furneaux decided losing at least £500,000 an acceptable write off.

I can accept if it's purely a financial logistics problem, but only just. Even if a player won't take a reduced deal when he is on a mountain wage. Also if he wants to wait and see what is around the corner. That's tough and nothing we can do, but this excuse absolutely had me in tears.

"Making an offer at the moment would only disincentives them, and give other clubs the idea of how much they need to offer."

He has to be kidding. If the side gets even more disincentive it would go completely AWOL. Also Mr Furneaux have you considered that performances could dip if a player is worried for his future?

How the hell does he work out that clubs would get an idea? It hardly will be a trade secret - a players wage. Surely the Agent of that player will have knowledge of his current deal and will try to get a matching offer.

Which suggests Town may as well start the bloody ball rolling in terms of getting everyone around the table.

If we going to offer a reduced term deal surely it would be better while he was in the safe net. At the end of the season it is a free for all. All deals will be on the table and other club will most certainly know the blooming score of what size of wage deal will get him to sign.

I have to say that this was one of the worst excuses yet from Mr "Downsize" Furneaux.

Crikey any more loss of the clubs silver tools and we will be playing kids. Gates will reflect this by going to even new low heights. Surely if Pouton, Boulding the main two left it's likely to drop another 1,000 fans of the gate. Can Grimsby afford to lose more fans with madcap hair brain Downsizing. What do we do then Mr Furneaux, downsize again because we are down to 2,500-3,500-fan base. When will it end, maybe when the side is no better than Grimsby Amateurs or Sunday league outfit.

Has he ever heard of contracts with clauses to protect the club? (i.e. Relegation release clauses or reduced wages if the worst happened.)

The simple truth Mr Furneaux is that Town cannot afford to lose these players.


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